The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2014 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 31,000 times in 2014. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 11 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Here is an attempt by me to consolidate these 12 names of Sun in the form of Shlokas. Since I know only Anushtup Chandas (meter), I am limited by 32 letters in each Shloka and hence had to resort to two Shlokas to cover all the names.

Suryanamaskara is typical done in the sets of 12 and each iteration is usually preceded by a Mantra which involves salutation to Sun using his various names. I have given the Mantras in Kannada as well as Sanskrit here. The short form (which is what is chanted during the Suryanamaskara) and the long form (Shloka from which it is derived) are given here.

I have been collecting books (and of course reading them!) for a long time now and realized that lately I have acquired quite a few “complete series” kind of books. Now when my existing book shelf
is unable to accommodate the new additions, I thought of writing about a few books that are close to my heart.

Sriman Mahabharata

This is a monumental work that provides simple Kannada translation of Vyasa Mahabharata. Published by Bharatha Darshana, this work consists of 32 volumes with more than 600 pages in each volume. I have been looking for this kind of work in Kannada which provides just the faithful translation of the original Sanskrit Shlokas and nothing else. Though this work doesn’t list and provide full translation of 100000 Mahabharata Shlokas, it includes quite a few shlokas in each of the version. Bharatha Darshana staff tell me that they have included only the important Shlokas but for the rest only the translation exists in the books. For those who want basic translations without any
interpretation of all 100000 Shlokas of Mahabharata, Gita Press provides such a series, but it is in Hindi.

This entire series costs Rs. 2300 which comes to around Rs 75 per book. Needless to say that the price is heavily subsidized.

Srimadvalmiki Ramayana

Last year I purchased this 3 volume series of Valmiki Ramayana in Kannada from Gita Press. These books provide basic Kannada translation of all the 24000 Shlokas from 7 Khandas of Valmiki Ramayana. I am actively reading this work from last year and till now completed Bala, Ayodhya and Aranya Khandas. I always wanted to read and understand the original Shlokas of Ramayana and this book is exactly serving the purpose. I have now acquired enough hold in Sanskrit language that I can follow the Sanskrit Shlokas with some help from the Kannada translation present in this book. I am
thoroughly enjoying this book both from Kavya perspective and the Sanskrit language learning perspective and I usually manage to read and understand at least one Sarga in a day. After reading 3
Khandas, I am realizing that we have been fed with many wrong interpretations of Ramayana which I plan to write about separately some other time.

This 3 volume set costs around Rs.600 which is of course heavily subsidized considering the paper and printing quality.

Kumaravyasa Bharata

Sometime back I happened to read Kuvempu’s autobiography Nenapina Doniyalli which includes hundreds of his poems. This inspired me to read (and of course write!) Kannada poetry and I bought Kumaravyasa Bharata edited and translated by A R Seturamrao. This book provides Kannada translation/interpretation of Kumaravyasa’s (aka Gadugina Naranappa) epic work Kumaravyasa Bharata aka Gadugina Bharata. In Kumaravyasa Bharata, Kumaravyasa has retold Vyasa Mahabharata in the form of Kannada poetry composed in Bhamini Shatpadi meter. For Kannadigas, this is like what Tulasidas Ramayana is for Hindi speaking population and it used to be the primary source of Mahabharata for my parents’ generation where singing, listening and interpreting the verses from Kumaravyasa Bharata used to be favorite evening pass time in many households.

Anything related to Mahabharata must be huge and so is this book comprising of 1300 pages. With high quality paper and printing, this single book costs Rs. 2500. This is the most expensive single
book that I have invested in till now!

Rigveda Samhita

The word Veda is so commonplace to us that I am sure most of us don’t know or never had opportunity to really know what’s in Vedas. In 1950s, Mysore Maharaja Jayachamarajendra Wadiyar brought together a team of Vidwans led by H. P Venkatrao to provide a version of Rigveda for Kannada speaking population. This monumental work resulted in a series of 36 books which are now being reprinted by Kannada and Culture Department, Government of Karnataka. This book lists each Rigveda Mantra, with word by word listing of the Mantra, description of it from Sayanacharya’s Bhashya, word by word meaning, translation, English translation, special notes and grammar notes.

This is a collector’s item and over last few years, I have managed to collect all 36 volumes with the intention of reading them after my retirement :) However quite a few retired people are advising me to finish this reading before retirement as their experience tells them that such work can’t be done with reduced mental faculties of old age!

Each volume has more than 750 pages with high quality print and paper. Each volume is available for a subsidized average price of Rs 250 per volume.

The History and Culture of Indian People

I picked up this series from Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan mainly as a reference book and not really for page-to-page reading. This is a set of 11 books covering Indian History from Vedic age till
Independence.

Shivaram Karanthara Sahitya Shreni

This is a series of books over 25 volumes that aims to include the complete works of Kannada writer K Shivaram Karanth. This was published by Kannada and Culture Department, Govt of Karnataka. Most of his novels and plays are included in these books. Each book has 2 novels and when I bought this, each book was available for as low as Rs.50!

The complete works of Swami Vivekananda

This is a set of 9 books (when I bought long time back) that includes Swami Vivekananda’s writings, lectures, discourses and more. Published by Advaita Ashrama Kolkata, it is generally available in Ramakrishna Ashram book shops.

DVG’s Jnapaka Chitrashale

This is a series of 8 books written by D V Gundappa (of Manku Thimmana Kagga fame) which describe certain aspects of DVG’s association and experiences with different kinds of people whom he came across throughout his life. He has categorized them into different categories like “common people”, “Patrons of Art” etc. This series should give a good insight into the life of DVG
himself.

Any day I would prefer bone-chilling cold or even rain to scorching sun during my treks. Apart from Ombattu Gudda trek and beach treks, I haven’t done treks post December in any trek season. So I was a bit weary when Pradeep Hegde invited me to join his group which was attempting to trek from Magod Falls to Shivaganga Falls during 1st weekend of April. I have visited both of these falls but the challenge in this trek was to follow and walk beside the river between these two falls. But the invitation was hard to resist as I would be venturing into Karnataka Western Ghats region in Uttara Kannada District for the first time. Moreover, I was just a participant in this trek as opposed to being an organizer in most of my treks which sometimes is easy.

Though I had booked the bus ticket till Yellapura, I got down at Sonda for a quick visit to my in-laws place, had a good breakfast and got myself dropped at Magod falls (around 35km from Sonda) in bike by my brother-in-law. While I waited at Magod for rest of the group to arrive, Pradeep asked to me instead come over to Jenukallu Gudda, a view point overlooking a valley and which is around 4km from Magod. Apparently a local had advised Pradeep to attempt the initial descent from Jenukallu Gudda since descending down the Magod falls will be difficult and will need ropes. Though our group was equipped with ropes, we decided to start with an easy descent. The group had 12 members: Pradeep, his neighbor Satheesh, Avinash, Venkataraghavan, Vinayak, Nagarjun, Bharath, Ravi, Naveen, Sriharsha, Abhishek and I. The original plan was to reach Bedti river at Magod, follow it downstream till it joins Shalmala River and continue following Shalmala river upstream until it reaches Shivaganga falls.

View from Jenukallu Gudda

We started the descent from Jenukallu Gudda (470m) at 10.45AM. The descent was mostly steep with dry leaves on the forest floor making the descent a bit more challenging. We lost altitude quickly and hit a jeep tack (80m) at 11.30AM. We took right deviation into the jeep track and started walking with the hope that we will reach the confluence of Bedti and Shalmala rivers along the way. After a few hundred meters into the track we could see a dried up river bed towards our left and we continued the walk for an hour or so under direct sun before reaching a Siddimane (A house belonging to Siddi tribe) at a village called Kelase. To our surprise, we learnt from Siddis that we are way ahead of the confluence point and are in fact walking in the opposite direction! At Siddimane, we took a break to prepare lemon juice since fresh water was available here.

Dried up river bed near Kelase village

At around 1.15PM, we reversed our direction, continued to make progress on the jeep track and reached another Siddimane at 2PM. We had a good lunch that included “Avalakki oggarane” from Pradeep’s house and “Masala Majjige” (butter milk) mixed with lemon grass. Post lunch, a Siddi boy briefly accompanied us till the river and after which we were on our own walking upstream along Shalmala river (after the confluence with Bedti) which had a good amount of water in it considering that it was summer. We were now on the right bank of the river and the path mostly consisted of boulders. The heat was a bit too much for me and the walk was made further difficult by the blisters I had all over the feet.

We went past a few Siddis who were fishing and finally reached the confluence (125m) of Bedti and Shalmala at 4.45PM. While the confluence point had a bit of depth and hence calm waters, the Shalmala side had gushing water and was rocky.

The confluence of Bedti and Shalmala rivers

Many of us spent some time cooling ourselves in Shalmala while most of the group had an extended river time at the confluence point. Swimming and breath-holding skills were at display: while Satheesh excelled in swimming and managed to crossover to the other bank, Vinayak could hold breath under water for more than 2min!

Our camping site was on the river bed at the confluence point which already had arrangements for stove (made of stones), all we needed was to get some dry wood which was available in plenty. Boiled rice Ganji with pickle, curd and butter milk was on the menu. Ganji was so very filling and was a bit unusual for me since we usually stick to ready-to-eat stuff to keep the logistics simple in our treks. The night was cloudy and warm and sleeping inside the sleeping bag wasn’t an option for many. There was even a light drizzle past midnight.

On Sunday morning, we got up fairly early and wanted to end the trek before noon to avoid the harsh summer sun. The combination of pickle and freshly obtained honey (given to us in the morning by Siddis from their night’s catch) gave a distinct flavour to yesterday’s Ganji and I could see Ganji was more in demand than the freshly prepared maggi noodles! We started upstream alongside Shalmala river at 8AM after a round of lemon tea with honey.

Shalmala river side was very rocky and we were mostly walking over huge boulders. We had to cross over to the opposite bank multiple times whenever forward progress on one bank was difficult or impossible. With the amount of water in the river in April, we mostly could negotiate the river without much difficulty and I am sure the challenges on this trail will be totally different if the water level was high. But we were facing a different challenge and that was the dry heat. The rate at which I was loosing water via sweat seemed to be more than the intake rate. Given that we were walking beside a river, there was never shortage of water fortunately.

River Shalmala

At 10.30AM when I was feeling a bit down, we had a lemon juice break. I must have taken close to a litre and it really helped to get my energy levels back. Next we climbed over to a small hill only to realize that it was more difficult than a small jump over the rock that we were planning to originally avoid. Thus we had to backtrack and make progress over the boulders itself. The quest for the end (Shivaganga falls) continued and we kept making progress in the hot sun. I even reached a stage where I felt just drinking loads of water wasn’t helping me and had to resort to Glucose which Pradeep was carrying. I can’t remember when I had taken Glucose on a trek, must have been in the last decade, but such was the harshness of this trek for me.

Shivaganga falls

Finally we reached the base of Shivaganga falls (270m) at 1PM where we consumed chapattis for lunch with Chatni pudi, jam and honey. Next it was a steep climb to reach the view point of the waterfalls (465m) from where we had hired a jeep. Thus ended one of the most difficult treks I have done in recent times. Though the trail distance and the terrain was manageable, the summer sun brought out a whole new challenge to the trek. I have done treks earlier in other extreme conditions like winter trek at -20°C in thigh deep snow, altitudes upwards of 5000m etc, but this summer trek in seemingly easy terrain turned to be a trek to remember as far as endurance is concerned.

When I was in Himalayas last year during the Animal Pass and Sara Umga Pass trek, I was forced to spend an idle day at Shamshi Thach, thanks to the bad weather. There was nothing else to do on that day and it was a bit depressing to look at clouds engulfing the peaks all around.

A peak seen from Shamshi Thach camp

The same peak masked by clouds

Now that depression has come out in the form of a poem in Sanskrit. The poet (who is also the trekker here) isn’t amused by the clouds covering all the beautiful peaks and gives a piece of his mind to the Clouds and also gives a bit of free advice!

The poem is set in Anushtup chandas. This being my 1st attempt in Sanskrit poetry, I am sure, will have mistakes, but I thank my brother-in-law Krishnamoorthy Bhat for suggesting some corrections and improvements.

मेघाक्षेपः

रचितं कालिदासेन खण्डकाव्यं तवोपरि |

प्रेमयुक्तं मनोहासं मेघ ते मधुरान्वितम् || १ ||

[O cloud, Kalidasa wrote a lyrical poem on you which had love, sweetness and that was enjoyable]

रचयाम्य्ल्पकाव्यन्तु एतत्त्वं श्रोतुमर्हसि |

उद्दिश्य त्वामहं सत्यं आकाशचलनप्रिय || २ ||

[One who likes to move in the sky (aka Cloud), (Now) I am writing a small poem addressing you that you should listen to]

मेघदूते गुणी भूत्वा अकरोत् कर्म वै सुखम् |

मत्काव्ये किन्तु आक्षेपं निश्चयेन करोम्यहम् || ३ ||

[In (Kalidasa’s poem) Meghadoota, you did a nice job being a good person. But in my poem, I am blaming you for sure]

शिखराणि अनेकानि शोभन्ते तु हिमालये |

हिमावृतानि सर्वाणि श्रेष्ठानि धवलानि च || ४ ||

[A number of snow-covered, white, high peaks adorn the Himalaya]

भ्रमसि त्वमहोरात्रं नित्यं मेघ हिमालये |

त्वमावृणोसि शैलानि यथा राहुः दिवाकरम् || ५ ||

[O cloud, you roam around the Himalaya day and right regularly, and cover/mask the peaks like how Rahu masks the Sun]

कान्तिहीनं प्रभाहीनं पर्वतं च करिष्यसि |

अविवेकं कठोरञ्च कार्यं तव न रोचते || ६ ||

[You take the shine out of the mountain and this thoughtless and cruel act of yours isn’t liked by me]

मित्रमस्ति गिरेर्मित्रः दुर्दशां न सहिष्यति |

क्षणमात्रेण ते गर्वः द्रविष्यति न संशयः || ७ ||

[Sun, who is mountain’s friend will not like his (mountain’s) bad situation. No doubt that your arrogance will melt in a jiffy (thanks to Sun)]

त्वामेव हि निरीक्षन्ते जनाः मीनं बकः यथा |

जलधर भवान् गत्वा वर्षधारां तथा कुरु || ८ ||

[People wait for you like crane waits (patiently, eagerly) for a fish. O cloud who holds the water, you go there and cause rain]

भवान्तु कुत आयातः यत्रकुत्रापि गच्छति |

तेन तुष्टो भविष्यामि मावृणोतु हिमश्रियम् || ९ ||

[Where do you come from ? You roam around aimlessly. Don’t mask the mountain and I will be happy]